Extreme krypton lightning delisting: the economic account and breakthrough war of "returning to an auspicious"
In less than a year, the "fastest US stock market listing" automobile brand is planning to withdraw from the NYSE and return to Geely. The news shook the whole circle.
On May 7th, Geely Automobile Holdings Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Geely Automobile") announced its plan to acquire all the issued shares of Extreme Krypton Intelligent Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Extreme Krypton"). Geely Automobile currently holds about 65.7% of the shares of Krypton. If the transaction is completed, Geely Automobile and Krypton will be completely merged, and Krypton will be privatized and delisted on the New York Stock Exchange. As of the close of May 8, Beijing time, the share price of Krypton was $52.19, up by 11.51%, with a total market value of 6.403 billion yuan.
Since the listing of Krypton brand in the US stock market in 2024, the sales growth has been weak due to problems such as "left-handed and right-handed fighting", and the annual target has made slow progress. Li Shufu, chairman of Geely Holding Group, stressed on May 7 that it is necessary to "continuously promote the integration of automobile business and return to a Geely".
"Economic Account" and "Breakthrough War" or the logic behind the reorganization of Geely Group.
Screenshot of Geely Automobile Announcement.
Less than a year after listing, the annual target of Krypton is progressing slowly.
It has been less than a year since the listing of U.S. stocks.
Born on April 15, 2021, Krypton announced its plan to go public in October 2022. On May 10th, 2024, Krypton was officially listed on the New York Stock Exchange, raising about US$ 441 million (about RMB 3.18 billion), making it the "fastest US stock listing" brand of new energy vehicles.
It is worth mentioning that in the A round of financing in February 2023, the valuation of Krypton was as high as 13 billion US dollars. However, before the official listing, the valuation of Krypton issuance was about 5.13 billion US dollars, which was reduced by half.
According to Krypton’s plan, we should strive to turn losses into profits in 2024. The 2024 financial report released in March this year showed that the company’s total revenue in 2024 was 75.91 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 47%; The annual net loss was 5.79 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 30%. From 2021 to 2023, the net loss of Krypton was 4.514 billion yuan, 7.655 billion yuan and 8.264 billion yuan respectively.
Li Shufu mentioned on May 7 that "in the face of fierce market competition and increasingly complex economic environment, we will assess the situation".
On May 8, Geely Group responded to the Beijing News Shell Finance reporter, saying that the reason for Geely’s acquisition of Krypton is subject to the announcement issued by the Group.
In the announcement, Geely Automobile mentioned that this move "aims to promote the deep integration and efficient coordination of internal resources, eliminate repeated investment, reduce costs, enhance the competitiveness of enterprises and create long-term value."
It can’t be ignored that the sales volume of the brand is under pressure this year. According to the latest sales data of Extreme Krypton Technology Group, the sales volume of Extreme Krypton brand in April was 13,727 units, down nearly 15% year-on-year and 11% quarter-on-quarter.
The sales target for 2025 previously announced by the Extreme Krypton brand is 320,000 vehicles. In the first four months of this year, the cumulative sales volume of the Extreme Krypton Group was 55,000 vehicles. The time schedule has passed one third, but the sales progress is only 17.2%.
"Divide the troops and fight" has left and right hands fighting each other.
Behind the pressure of krypton sales, in addition to the great competitive pressure, the internal "dividing troops" is also the problem.
Krypton 001 is the flagship model of Krypton brand. In February, 2024, the 2024 Extreme Krypton 001 went on the market. In the first month, it was set to exceed 30,000 vehicles, and the monthly sales in June reached 14,000 vehicles, a record high. But then sales declined, and the myth of "selling one car in one minute" came to an abrupt end.
However, the competition from competing models has become increasingly fierce: the first model of Xiaomi Automobile, SU7, was launched in March 2024; The 2024 Zhijie S7 was released in April 2024; Tesla 3 high-performance version was officially sold from June 2024.
Therefore, in August 2024, the 2025 Kykrypton 001 was quickly listed, and the Mobileye chip used in 2024 was replaced by NVIDIA dual OrinX chip, which improved the computing power and the starting price was 259,000 yuan. However, some car owners have publicly pointed out that "the annual model is launched in half a year" and "the model of three years can be bought in the same year" leads to the rapid depreciation of the vehicle.
On September 20, 2024, the SUV model was launched with a starting price of 229,900 yuan. For a time, the voice of "Extreme Krypton 001 or Extreme Krypton 7X is more cost-effective" emerges endlessly, and both sides are regarded as competitors, and their left and right hands are fighting each other.
In the context of declining sales, recently, Extreme Krypton Technology Group announced internally that Lin Jie, vice president of the group and general manager of Linke Sales Company, was in charge of the overall work of domestic marketing service of Extreme Krypton brand. It is understood that Lin Jie has been the general manager of Link Sales Company since 2018, and became the vice president of Extreme Technology Group in February 2025.
Geely Reorganizes "Fighting Ecology"
In fact, since 2024, Geely Group has reorganized its business segments several times.
In October, 2024, Geometry brand was officially merged into Geely Galaxy. On February 14, 2025, the brand of Extreme Krypton and Link merged rapidly in just three months, and the Extreme Krypton Technology Group was announced.
An Conghui, president of Geely Holding Group and CEO of Extreme Krypton Technology Group, described the plan of integrating Extreme Krypton and Linke in an exclusive interview with the Beijing News Shell Finance reporter: Extreme Krypton Technology Group strives to build a world-leading high-end luxury new energy automobile group with annual production and sales of one million levels through two years’ efforts.
In March 2025, Yizhen brand was officially merged into Geely Galaxy. In addition, there are rumors that Geely Group wants to include Ruilan Automobile. However, on April 10th, Qianli Technology, the controlling shareholder of Ruilan Automobile, responded to an investor’s question and said that there is no plan to transfer the equity to Geely Automobile at present.
Wang Peng, an associate researcher at the Beijing Academy of Social Sciences, told the Shell Finance reporter of the Beijing News that car companies are all changing from "fighting for products" to "fighting for ecology". Behind the repeated restructuring of Geely Group, "economic account" and "breakthrough war" are two key words.
In terms of "economic account", Extreme Krypton Technology Group publicly stated that after the merger of Extreme Krypton and Lectra, the new group company expects to save 10%-20% in R&D investment, and the R&D expense ratio is expected to drop from 11% to 6%. At the same time, with the support of large manufacturing system, the cost of bill of materials is saved by 5%-8% and the manufacturing is saved by 3%-5%. Among them, the management fee will be saved by 10%-20%, and the management fee rate is expected to be reduced from 11% to 8%.
In fact, on September 1, 2024, Geely mentioned in the Taizhou Declaration that conflicts of interest and repeated investment should be reduced. The reason why Geely Automobile mentioned the acquisition of Krypton also means to eliminate repeated investment and reduce costs.
"Breakthrough War" refers toConcentrate on doing great things and form an ecological circle. Wang Peng pointed out that in the early years, Geely comprehensively covered different markets through many brands such as Krypton, Link and Geometry, but this model led to internal consumption of resources and prone to homogenization competition.
In response to this adjustment, Li Shufu voiced on May 7th that he should continue to promote the integration of automobile business, return to a Geely, integrate technological advantages, improve innovation ability and profitability, continue to create long-term value, and build the world’s leading intelligent electric vehicle group. At the same time, it will maintain close communication and cooperation with American and international capital markets.
According to the latest statement of Geely Automobile, Geely Group will create a unified listing platform, and fully integrate extremely krypton assets and resources, thus enhancing the competitiveness of the passenger car business of the Group.
Geely’s integration drama will continue.
Beijing News Shell Financial Reporter Lin Zi
Editor Yang Juanjuan
Proofread Lin Zhao